Vampire Traits
The Embrace comes with many drawbacks. However, it also comes with numerous advantages. Every vampire can use the following edges. Many of these advantages require Vitae. These expenditures are reflexive, and subject to the vampire’s Vitae per turn limit as determined by her Blood Potency Clans Clans are vampiric lineages: the "families" of the Kindred. In modern nights, a majority of known vampires belong to only five clans. _____ Daeva Sensual and seductive social predators. They have great difficulty resisting their vices. Nickname: Serpents Clan Bane (The Wanton Curse): You taste the romance in all things, but none so much as blood. Mortals are not just food. They are your obsession, and that fixation grows with every sip. Drink more than once, from any mortal, and you risk becoming emotionally dependent on your prey. Favored Attributes: Dexterity or Manipulation Disciplines: Celerity, Majesty, Vigor _____ Gangrel Animalistic savages with a strong connection to the Beast, and find it hard to reason like men. Nickname: Savages Clan Bane (The Feral Curse): The Beast lethargically coils under the R-Complex of most Kindred. But you and the Beast are as thick as thieves. It rises and rips out of your skin to protect you from the bad, bad world. But it has a price. It’s harder to resist the Beast’s call, harder still to remember why you should even want to. Favored Attributes: Composure or Stamina Disciplines: Animalism, Protean, Resilience _____ Mekhet Masters of secrets and shadows, suffer the pain of fire and sunlight more harshly than other vampires. Clan Bane (The Tenebrous Curse): Whispering shades and forgotten lore lurk in your blood. Secrets and information distill down to a weird substance in your Vitae. Attuned to the otherworldly, vampire banes express themselves more quickly in you. Sunlight, fire, and the long slumber of torpor pull at your dead body with a stronger tide. Favored Attributes: Intelligence or Wits Disciplines: Auspex, Celerity, Obfuscate _____ Nosferatu Vampires are supernaturally terrifying monsters, some hideously deformed, others oddly unsettling, but whatever the cause, every Nosferatu finds it nigh impossible to socialize. Clan Bane (The Lonely Curse): You are an avatar of disgust. Dread and discomfort oozes from you, scabbing everything over in the putrid film of your rotting soul’s exhaust. Your body is warped, or the world around you warps. This could manifest in ways grotesque or subtle. Fear and all its gibbering siblings come easy for you. Most other forms of social communion do not. Yours is a lonely Requiem. Favored Attributes: Composure or Strength Disciplines: Nightmare, Obfuscate, Vigor _____ Ventrue Lords of the undead, rulers with regal bearing. Centuries of absolute power have corrupted them, and as they age they become more and more prone to insanity. Clan Bane (The Aloof Curse): Excellence breeds contempt. When people are puppets for your will and buildings are play pieces on a grand game board, it is hard not to become distant. It is so very easy for you to become detached from those people, places, and things that keep the Man secure in your breast. Favored Attributes: Presence or Resolve Disciplines: Animalism, Dominate, Resilience Covenants The Carthian Movement applies mortal solutions to immortal problems with modern and experimental government. The Circle of the Crone venerates female divinity, painful change, and the old ways remixed for the modern world. The Invictus safeguards the Masquerade with hierarchy and tradition. The Lancea et Sanctum preaches a dark faith; they are both wolves and shepherds. The Ordo Dracul struggles to transcend the Curses through eldritch alchemies and rites. Tricks of the Damned Blush of Life By spending a point of Vitae, Kindred may invoke the blush of life for a scene. This makes them functionally human. They become warm to the touch, with a full, hearty pulse. They produce natural bodily fluids. They function sexually in the way a human can, becoming physically aroused, erect, and lubricated. They can keep food and drink down, ejecting it later in the night. They’ll pass medical inspection while the blush remains active. _____ Kindred Senses Kindred do not suffer normal vision penalties for being in the dark, and can compensate with hearing. In full darkness, they only suffer a –2 die penalty to rolls that require vision. If they encounter traces of blood, even if dried or hidden (in a carpet, for example), they immediately see even very small quantities. Vampire hearing becomes similarly enhanced. They can hear heartbeats at three yards or meters per dot of Blood Potency. Upon Embrace, a vampire’s sense of smell attunes to the scent of blood. A vampire can smell the presence of blood from about ten yards or meters per dot of Blood Potency without rolling. Multiply this range by her Auspex dots. If she’s tasted a particular human’s blood, she can add her Blood Potency to any rolls to track him by scent. Kindred blood does not offer this advantage, since it’s mostly old, dead, and its smell is a blend of all the vampire’s recent victims. If any of her Kindred senses apply, add her Blood Potency to any rolls to detect hidden people or details by the traces of blood. _____ Physical Intensity With Vitae, any Kindred can accomplish massive bursts of physical prowess. By spending a point of Vitae, he may add two dice to rolls involving his choice of Strength, Dexterity, or Stamina for the turn. This does not increase traits derived from these Attributes. However, it will increase relevant resistances. For example, a Strength increase will reduce an opponent’s rolls to grapple him. Healing A single point of Vitae heals two points of bashing damage, or one point of lethal damage. A single aggravated wound requires five Vitae and a full day’s sleep. Aggravated damage is the only type of wound that leaves a scar on Kindred. The scar appears natural, unlike the original damage. _____ Cleansing While Kindred sleep, they return to the time of their Embrace. Anything that wouldn’t constitute a Health level of damage heals automatically and returns to its original state. For this reason, many sires recommend their childer groom for the Embrace, as part of the ritual of entering the Danse. If an injury would require Vitae to heal (represented by Health levels), the vampire will unconsciously heal it during daysleep. Sometimes, this means the vampire will not have the Vitae necessary to wake. As she falls to slumber, she may spend Willpower points to “preserve” wounds through her rest, to keep herself from healing them and spending excessive Vitae. This cost is once per wound, and covers the wound permanently. Sometimes, Kindred force other marks to remain. For example, vampires often keep scars, tattoos, and piercings for spiritual reasons or just to fit in with the flock. Many Kindred remove long hair, in favor of wigs or cleaner, more modern styles. The vampire spends Willpower to fight the healing process while she sleeps. After a day’s rest, any damage heals as normal, but her body remains changed. _____ Predatory Aura Every step she takes, every corner she turns, a Kindred’s Beast stands ready to face threats, to defend territory, and most importantly, to feed. To the Beast, everything is a challenge, a potential conquest, a meal, or a combination of the three. To other predators, the Beast is a palpable thing, something that identifies another monster. This presence, the predatory aura, builds a paradox in Kindred society. On one hand, it guarantees vampires will never truly be civil, as all remain one misstep away from each other’s throats. On the other hand, it forces Kindred to hold tight to traditions and propriety, in order to keep the Beast at bay and force a modicum of nicety. Without a Discipline or other ability to mask or suppress the predatory aura, Kindred perceive other vampires as their own kind. If they can smell the vampire, they know it’s a vampire. If they touch a vampire, they know it’s a vampire. Note that this is one-sided: One character may not notice the other. It’s not just the aura, it’s all the right cues. Kindred notice the shallow or nonexistent breathing of their kind. They notice the subtle, predatory tones in a voice. They smell multiple victims’ blood on another. Further, a vampire can voluntarily intensify her predatory aura to elicit a reaction. Against other Kindred, this escalates the encounter, forcing fight or flight instincts. Against mortals, this asserts power and cows the lesser creatures. Lashing out with the Beast takes an instant action, and against Kindred costs a point of Willpower. It’s free to use against a mortal. _____ The Bestial Triad Every vampire can evoke three aspects of the Beast; the monstrous, the seductive, and the competitive. The aura chosen reflects the way the vampire approaches the confrontation. It also determines the Conditions given during the clash. The Monstrous Beast: This represents the Beast-As-Destroyer. Its every instinct is to rip asunder. The monstrous aura inspires a witness to fight or flee. It evokes the most primitive survival instincts in its victims, and causes the Bestial Condition (p. 301). The Seductive Beast: This is the Beast-As-Tempter. It needs hot abandon, and a temporary escape from reality. It inspires the need for immediate, throwaway coupling. It evokes the primal need for instant gratification, and causes the Wanton Condition (p. 307). The Competitive Beast: This is the Beast-As-Alpha. It needs to come out on top, to command, to control. It inspires power plays and dominance games. It evokes the need for a rigid hierarchy, a food chain, and causes the Competitive Condition (p. 302). _____ Lashing Out To lash out, the vampire must take a simple action appropriate to the aspect of predator used. A monstrous Beast growls, threatens, gnashes teeth, or calls to action. A seductive Beast sidles up to the prey, whispers beautiful lies, or gives a telling gaze from across the crowd. A competitive Beast draws a line in the sand, announces terms, or takes the role of mouse in a chase. Roll Blood Potency, plus a Power Attribute. Use Strength for monstrous, Presence for seductive, and Intelligence for competitive. The modifiers below apply to all rolls for predatory aura. Both sides may use whatever modifiers apply. Note that Disciplines do not add to predatory aura rolls unless specifically mentioned. For example, Vigor does not add to the monstrous Beast, and Majesty does not add to the seductive Beast. The opposition has two choices; fight or flight. Fight: This represents a counter-challenge. One Beast flares, and is met with equal aggression. This requires a point of Willpower if the responding character’s Blood Potency is lower than that of the vampire who lashed out. Roll an appropriate Power Attribute + Blood Potency to contest. This does not have to be the same aspect of the Beast. For example, if a vampire confronts another with the seductive Beast, the opposition may opt to respond with greater implied violence, and oppose with the monstrous Beast. If the aggressor scores more successes, the victim gains the Condition associated with the aggressor’s Beast. As well, the aggressor gains a +2 die bonus on any rolls to pursue her aspect’s interests for the remainder of the scene. If the opposition scores more successes, he turns the confrontation on the aggressor. The opposition imposes the Condition associated with his Beast, and gains a +2 die bonus on any rolls to pursue his Beast’s compulsions for the remainder of the scene. Mortals can fight the Beast, but they cannot impose a Condition on the vampire. They do gain the +2 die bonus to attack, flee, or otherwise neutralize the risk. If both characters achieve the same number of successes, they both impose their Conditions, but neither gets the +2 die bonus. Flight: This represents a stark withdrawal. It costs nothing, and allows for a reasonable out from the challenge. This usually means a convenient escape or excuse to pull away. It typically makes the character look inferior or foolish. The aggressor may pursue. The victim gains the Condition associated with the initiating vampire’s aspect of the Beast. _____ Torpor & Final Death Kindred have little to fear from bashing wounds. A vampire remains conscious when her last box is full of bashing damage. She still suffers wound penalties. However, when her last box is marked with lethal wounds, she falls to torpor (see p. 105). When her last box is marked with aggravated damage, she suffers Final Death. Within a minute, her body reverts to its true age. For younger Kindred, this means decomposition, with a collapse of skeletal structure and soft tissues turning to liquids, ash, and minerals. For the oldest Kindred, this means a full disintegration into a pile of dust and ash, with only the tiniest fragments of bone remaining. Powers of the Blood Blood Potency For every twenty-five years a vampire spends in torpor, she loses a dot of Blood Potency. Many elders fall into voluntary slumber in order to ease their feeding restrictions, or simply out of boredom and melancholy. Some find a perverse excitement in the prospect of waking to a whole new world. When her Blood Potency falls below six dots, the vampire does not lose any Attributes or Skills above the fifth dot. Blood Sympathy Blood calls to blood. Relatives by blood share a certain amount of mystical sympathy; they can feel one another at their most important moments. They sometimes feel strong sensations and emotions from their relatives, including frenzies, the pain of violent torpor, and the shame of crushing defeat. This is rarely with clarity; it comes in the form of cryptic symbols, daymares, and hallucinations. Only the strongest ties — such as those between sire and childe — result in clear messages. The various effects depend on how many steps removed the two characters are. Once Removed: This step is for sires and their childer exclusively. Sires and childer enjoy a +3 on all sympathy-based rolls. This level of sympathy has no range limits; sires and childer feel each other world-around. Twice Removed: This step is for siblings, grandchilder, and grandsires. Twice-removed Kindred receive a +2 die bonus on all sympathy-based rolls. Sympathy affects any relative on the same continent. Thrice Removed: This step is for cousins, a sire’s siblings, and great grandsires and great grandchilder. Thrice-removed Kindred receive a +1 die bonus on all sympathy-based rolls. Sympathy affects any relative in the same city. Four Times Removed: This final step is for all clanmates. They receive no modifiers for sympathy rolls. Sympathy affects any clanmate within a mile. Sympathy comes into effect automatically any time a vampire’s relative enters torpor or suffers Final Death. The feeling washes over the vampire and she senses her relative’s state in vague, often symbolic terms. As well, characters can initiate sympathy to communicate their states of being to their relatives once or twice removed. To do so, they must spend a Willpower point and make a Blood Potency roll. Each success allows them to contact a single relative; the relative must still make the roll to detect sympathy. Any particularly powerful emotion can trigger sympathy, at Storyteller discretion. This is less a foolproof detective tool, more a dramatic device. Any time a relative suffers a horrible fate, sympathy may cause frenzies. When prompted, a character may roll to detect blood sympathy. She may also spend a point of Willpower to force sympathy and detect a specific relative, assuming they’re within the range allotted by their tie. Some Kindred use sympathy to track their family members. _____ Dice Pool: Wits + Blood Potency + Blood Sympathy Action: Instant Dramatic Failure: Rolls to detect Sympathy cannot dramatically fail. Failure: The sympathetic tie fails. Success: The character connects with the relative. She gets a vague impression of the character’s mental state, and his general direction. If the relative enters torpor or Final Death, his relative knows one of those two things has happened (but not which). Exceptional Success: The character connects clearly. She understands her relative’s mental state, his direction from her, and his rough distance from her. She knows if he’s reached torpor or Final Death. In addition, he send a message of a single, short sentence that she hears through the blood tie. As well as feeling the sensations of their relatives, vampires are more capable of using their Disciplines on those with whom they share blood ties. If a vampire uses a Discipline on a relative, add the blood sympathy bonus to the roll. Rolls made to enact Crúac sorcery use double this modifier. _____ Vitae Addiction Any time a character drinks Kindred Vitae, he must roll Resolve + Composure, with a –1 die penalty for each point consumed. If he fails, he gains the Persistent Addicted Condition (see p. 301). Any time he’s faced with further opportunities to drink Vitae, he must indulge, succeed in a Resolve + Composure roll, or gain the Deprived Condition. If a character tempts him with Vitae, she may make a Contested roll (usually Manipulation + Persuasion or something similar) against his Resolve + Composure. Once Kindred reach a certain degree of power, blood addiction no longer threatens them. If a vampire can only garner sustenance from Kindred (at six dots or more of Blood Potency), she is immune to blood addiction. This doesn’t render her immune to blood bonds, however. _____ Blood Bonds Any time a character imbibes a point or more of Vitae, it creates or reinforces a blood bond. The bond comes in three stages, usually at the first, second, and third drinks. Kindred characters can attempt to resist the bond by spending Willpower. Make a Blood Potency roll, minus the number of Vitae ingested. The Willpower point does not add to this roll. If successful, that drink does not add to the bond. However, the character suffers Vitae addiction normally. Any further attempts to resist the bond from the same vampire suffer a cumulative –1 die penalty; even ancient Kindred cannot resist the bond forever. Mortals have no such defense. First Stage: Have you ever felt a crush, that butterflies-in-thestomach feeling, but for someone you know you shouldn’t want to have anything to do with? Have you ever kissed someone, and loved it at the time, then regretted it later, only to know you were going to do it again and love it just as much? That’s what the first stage of the bond feels like. It’s not love. It couldn’t convince anyone but maybe an inexperienced teen that he’s in love. But it pulls you and makes you want. It makes you want to be close to your regnant. It makes you want their approval. When taking a Social maneuver against her thrall, the regnant’s impression is considered one step higher (see p. 174). As well, she gains a +1 die bonus on any Social action or Discipline roll against the thrall. Causing direct or indirect harm to one’s regnant constitutes a breaking point at Humanity/Integrity 5. Second Stage: Have you ever felt complete and utter tension when simply thinking about someone? Have you ever made a stupid excuse to run off and touch yourself to get rid of that tension? Have you ever blushed when someone’s name came up,then lashed out when someone accused you of having feelings for them? This is what the second stage of the bond feels like. It’s easy to confuse for love. It’s a strong, pervasive affection that makes you vulnerable, and keeps you persistently wanting more. When taking a Social maneuver against her thrall, the regnant’s impression is considered two steps higher (see p. 174). As well, she gains a +2 die bonus on any Social action or Discipline roll against the thrall. Causing indirect or direct harm to one’s regnant constitutes a breaking point at Humanity/3, or on Integrity with a penalty of –3. Third Stage: Has someone’s name alone make you bite your lower lip in anticipation? Has it ever aroused you to imagine her reaction to something you’ve done? Have you ever sabotaged something that could have been special, for fear of its intrusion between you and her? Has your brain gone wild, imagining the worst possible scenario when she meets someone new? Have you ever thought to intervene in order to protect what you have? Have you ever tried to agitate her, because her irritation is better than her neglect? This is the feeling of a full blood bond. It’s nothing short of infatuation. It’s a tantalizing, forceful affection that always eats at the back of your mind. When taking a Social maneuver against her thrall, the regnant’s impression is always considered perfect (see p. 174). As well, she gains a +3 die penalty on any Social action or Discipline roll against the thrall. Causing indirect or direct harm to one’s regnant constitutes a breaking point at Humanity/Integrity 1. Lastly, all of the regnant’s lingering Discipline effects gain additional duration. Any Discipline that would last a scene lasts one night. Any that last a night instead last a week. One week becomes one month. One month becomes one year. Once the bond reaches the third stage, it shatters all other existing bonds, and prevents further bonds from forming. The blood bond lasts a year from the most recent drink. Full or partial, the bond disintegrates after that time. Outside waiting out the year, methods for diffusing the bond — save for an overwhelming third-stage bond — are unreliable myths at best. The year limit isn’t quite on a calendar…it can vary by a few days or weeks. We simplify to a year for easy gameplay. _____ Embrace, Posthumous Embrace, and Ghouls The act of the Embrace is a willful action; Vitae alone is not enough to wake the victim, a sire must choose to commit the Embrace. This choice comes at the price of a Humanity dot. This means that the traditional Embrace is never accidental. If a mortal has fed from a vampire in at any point in her lifetime, she is a candidate for the posthumous Embrace regardless of her cause of death. Within a week of her death, before significant decomposition sets in, contact with Kindred Vitae could mean she awakens as Kindred. The donor rolls his Blood Potency. If the roll is successful, the corpse rises in seven nights, minus one for every success on the Blood Potency roll. This costs the donor a Humanity dot only if he makes a deliberate choice to attempt an Embrace. (The troupe should exercise some common sense and avoid “accidental” Embraces achieved through ridiculous contortions of events.) Creating a ghoul requires one point of Vitae, and a point of Willpower. A ghoul needs further Vitae monthly, but no further Willpower. _____ Diablerie & Tainted Condition To commit diablerie, a vampire must drink from her victim beyond the point of Final Death. Once a Kindred victim is completely without Vitae, each point that would otherwise be taken becomes instead one point of lethal damage. Once the victim’s Health boxes are full of aggravated damage, the victim’s very soul struggles against his assailant as he reaches Final Death. At this point, the murderer’s player spends a point of Willpower and rolls Strength + Resolve. Vigor may add dice to this roll; the Willpower point does not. The murderer may continue to roll, until she runs out of Willpower to spend, or she achieves a number of successes equal to the victim’s Blood Potency dots. Once she reaches that mark, the diablerie is complete. The murderer immediately gains one Experience per dot of the victim’s Blood Potency. This Experience may only be used to purchase Blood Potency dots. It can be saved if it’s not enough to buy a dot. As well, the murderer gains a dot of the highest of the victim’s Disciplines that she does not have herself. If she has all of the victim’s Disciplines at equal or higher level, she instead gains a Skill dot from her victim’s repertoire. Diablerie is always a breaking point, regardless of the vampire’s Humanity score. The very act feels heinous. During and after the act, the murderer feels dirty and wrong. She sometimes hears the victim’s voice in the back of her mind, urging her toward oblivion as penance for her crime. Most Kindred will kill a human at some point during her Requiem, but Amaranth is far more than extinguishing a life: It’s the willful destruction of a soul. While modern, secular minds often eschew the existence of a soul, a diablerist will never deny its existence. Diablerie causes the Tainted Condition (see p. 306). Diablerie, while perverse, is the greatest rugsh a vampire can experience. The sensation and resulting power are utterly addictive. Do not roll to resist addiction; the addiction takes automatically. Resisting a reasonable opportunity to commit Amaranth in the future requires a Resolve + Composure roll, with a penalty equal to the would-be victim’s Blood Potency dots. Failure results in the Persistent Addicted Condition (see p. 301). Bloody Curses Sunlight Frequency & Damage Disciplines __NONEWSECTIONLINK__